Richard Sutton, Professor and iCORE chair of computer science at University of Alberta

He states that there is “certainly a significant chance within all of our expected lifetimes” that human-level AI will be created, then goes on to say the AIs “will not be under our control”, and so on

Marvin Minsky, Mathematician, computer scientist, and pioneer in the field of artificial intelligence

The ultimate risk comes when our greedy, lazy, masterminds are able at last to take that final step: to design goal-achieving programs which are programmed to make themselves grow increasingly powerful.

I don’t like the ‘Plan B’ idea that we want to go to space so we have a backup planet, we have sent probes to every planet in this solar system, and believe me, this is the best planet. There is no doubt. This is the one that you want to protect.

This phrase will save a lot of time. If you have conviction on a particular direction even though there's no consensus, it's helpful to say, "Look, I know we disagree on this but will you gamble with me on it? Disagree and commit?" By the time you're at this point, no one can know the answer for sure, and you'll probably get a quick yes.

The SEC's pay ratio disclosure rule is thoughtful, balanced, and carefully crafted to provide companies considerable flexibility and makes accommodations to them in complying with the rule, while giving shareholders valuable new information

I’m a believer in what’s called nudging -- small changes that can have a behavioral impact. It’s clear that companies think harder about how they present themselves when they have to publish information

Estimated spending will be 1–2 percent of GDP, with economic, social and political benefits several times larger. Net program costs will be much lower, since spending on unemployment compensation and other relief will be reduced—this program will pay people for working, rather than paying them not to work. The promise of increased national productivity and shared prosperity should far outweigh an...See More

Isn't there a better way to answer to answer to the concerns of the beneficiaries of Government benefits? Yes of course: by allocating the sums that we could gather for a UBI program to ensure free basic necessities (food, accommodation, transportation, connectivity) - a measure that, unlike UBI, would not be consumerist in its approach and that would therefore respect the environment. Free necess...See More

They call it the basic income of all citizens (“reddito di cittadinanza”), but here in Italy we will call it the basic income of the land (“reddito della gleba”, in reference to feudal serfs, or “servi della gleba”, who were linked to the land). We would save characters, and we will be closer to the essence of the reasoning. As much as serfdom (“servitu’ della gleba”) linked the serfs to the land,...See More

Henning Meyer, Social scientist, consultant and analyst. He is Editor-in-Chief of Social Europe

Paying people a basic income would not remove the fundamental problem that in the digital economy some people will do extraordinarily well and many others find themselves left behind. One oft-heard argument is that if people want more money than basic income provides they can just work a few days. If the problem is technological unemployment, however, this option is simply removed as the large-sca...See More

Rick Salutin, Novelist, playwright, journalist, and critic. University of Toronto

And what if the owning and renting classes simply view a BI as another source to be scarfed up through higher rents, charges, privatized highways etc., so it ends up merely expanding the gulf between the rich and the rest?(...) So the GBI just gets recycled back up to those who made it necessary in the first place. The inequality gulf worsens and is financed largely by taxes from people who can’t ...See More

But why insist on delivering that generosity in the specific form of "here's a make-work job for you to do in exchange for a check"? Why not just hand over the check? That way you don't need to cut as many checks to people supervising the work, obtaining the equipment to do the work, etc.

What is most important is making sure service members can meet the physical training standards, and the willingness to defend our freedoms and way of life. While taxpayers shouldn’t cover the costs associated with a gender reassignment surgery, Americans who are qualified and can meet the standards to serve in the military should be afforded that opportunity

Paul De Grauwe, Economist. Professor in European Political Economy at the London School of Economics

A universal basic income that has the ambition to ban poverty from the world, is then immensely expensive. That doesn’t need to surprise you. To give the poor (a minority in society) a basic income, you have to also provide a basic income to the large majority that doesn’t need it. This leads to new problems. The working majority receives a basic income that stands loose from labor efforts, bu...See More

The job guarantee is a proposal that provides greater macroeconomic stability and secures a fundamental human right. The job guarantee would run through the social enterprise sector, which includes traditional nonprofit organizations and emerging nonprofit social entrepreneurial ventures.

The reason they adore UBI isn’t to do with their commitment to lift a growing underclass out of poverty; that’s just a bedtime story that helps the super-wealthy sleep. Instead, it’s more to permit spending on their goods by what remains of the American middle class. No one on a stagnant wage can currently buy the things that Musk—and the rest of Silicon Valley—wants to sell them.

This is made clear by taking the argument to its logical conclusion and considering a government proposal that paid one set of workers to dig ditches and the other set to fill them back in. While there would be a virtually unlimited number of jobs that could be created under such a program, there is clearly no value creation of any kind. Thus, a government-mandated job omits the very thing that ma...See More

Dean Baker, Macroeconomist and codirector of the Center for Economic and Policy Research

A jobs guarantee may be a good aspirational goal, but we have a lot of messy work that we have to deal with first. If the push for a jobs guarantee distracts from this work, then it will be a major step backwards

The first major intervention should be the announcement by the Federal government of a Job Guarantee, which would unconditionally provide a minimum wage job to anybody who could not find work elsewhere.

Jared Bernstein, Senior Fellow at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities

Are the good, effective anti-poverty programs currently in place fully funded? I’m quite certain they’re not, and thus the question for progressives is what gets us the bigger inequality-and-poverty-reducing-bang-for-the-buck: a dollar to UBI, or a dollar to things like quality pre-school, the EITC and CTC (wage subsidies for low-income, working families), expanding Medicaid, SNAP (food stamps), a...See More

Asian-Americans are indeed treated unfairly in admissions, but affirmative action is a convenient scapegoat for those who seek to pit minority groups against each other. A more logical target would be "the preferences of privilege,"

The JG policy is a bold and effective alternative. It is a proven policy that mobilizes the most valuable resource of any economy: labor. By providing a framework within which productive activity replaces forced idleness, Greek workers would earn a minimum wage while creating the very goods and services that benefit their communities, across Greece.

Adam Smith, Democrat, member of the United States House of Representatives

The idea that the American people need to be paying for these types of operations to change your sex is not very wise from a standpoint of economics. I think the president makes some good decisions about making sure that we have a force that is capable